DHAKA, June 1: The military-backed caretaker government of Bangladesh appears to have started a fresh drive to detain political activists across the country in the name of conducting ‘a routine operation to contain crimes’.

The major political parties have reacted sharply to the new drive, claiming that the operation is aimed at frightening the politicians to submission.

The army-led forces had started the operation on Friday midnight, particularly after the two major political parties, Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Bangladesh Awami League, had separately announced that they would not attend the government sponsored ‘dialogue’ without ‘unconditional release’ of the two top leaders — Begum Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina. Khaleda and Hasina have been detained on graft charges since Sept 3 and July 16 last year.

However, during the fresh drive beginning on Friday night the government has arrested some 200 leading activists of the BNP and Awami League from different districts of the country.

The Inspector General of Police, Nur Mohammad, claimed to the media that the ‘drive is a routine one to contain crimes’ while the targets of the operation are ‘wanted criminals, extortionists and fugitives from justice’. The IGP also hinted that the drive ‘would continue for a month or so’.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the mainstream political parties have reacted sharply to the fresh police drive.

The BNP secretary general, Khandaker Delwar Hossain, strongly criticised fresh drive, terming it ‘an attempt to frighten political activists into refraining from protest movements’. “The government has launched a fresh drive against politicians simply to frighten them into submission.”

Matia Chowdhury, a presidium member of the Awami League, termed the drive as part of the government’s design to terrorise politicians and continue repression against the political class. “The government has launched the drive as soon as major political parties declined to attend the dialogue (with the government) without their leaders now detained in prisons,” she said. “Those who have been detained during the drive are neither criminals nor extortionists, nor are they fugitives from justice.”

Notably, most of the arrested over the last couple of days were detained under the emergency powers rule. They were subsequently sent to prisons.

The Amnesty International reported last week that the military controlled government of Bangladesh have arrested over 4,40,000 people since the country’s President promulgated a State of Emergency on January 2007.